18 August

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Patent Infringement and Remedies Under Nigerian Law

in Class Notes, Educational Articles, Exam Prep, IP Law

In 2007, a Federal High Court in Lagos found that two Nigerian companies, Tyonex Nigeria Limited and Ebamic Pharmacy Limited, had infringed Pfizer's registered Nigerian patent by importing and selling a pharmaceutical product called "Amlovas," which contained Amlodipine Besylate, the active compound that Pfizer had patented in Nigeria for its cardiovascular drug Norvasc. The court granted an injunction and awarded damages in Pfizer's favour. It took five years from the filing of the suit to the judgment. In a separate matter, a patent infringement dispute between Dr. C.J.A. Uwemedimo and Mobil Producing Nigeria Unlimited began in the early 2000s and...

15 August

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How to Register a Patent in Nigeria: The Application Process and the Deposit System Problem

Posted by Kolawole Adebowale

in Class Notes, Educational Articles, IP Law

In the early years of Nigeria's HIV/AIDS epidemic, when antiretroviral drugs were protected by patents held primarily by multinational pharmaceutical companies and priced far beyond the reach of most Nigerians, the question of whether Nigeria could override those patent monopolies to access cheaper generic versions became one of the most pressing public health questions in the country. The legal answer, if Nigeria chose to use it, was yes: the Patents and Designs Act gives Nigerian courts the power to grant compulsory licences allowing the manufacture or importation of patented products without the patent holder's consent. The practical answer was that...

15 August

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Patentable Inventions in Nigeria: What the Patents and Designs Act Protects

Posted by Kolawole Adebowale

in Class Notes, Educational Articles, IP Law

In 2001, the World Trade Organization's Doha Declaration on TRIPS and Public Health confirmed that developing countries could use compulsory licensing and other TRIPS flexibilities to produce or import generic versions of patented medicines for public health emergencies. Nigeria, a country where access to patented antiretroviral drugs and essential medicines has been a live public health issue, is one of the countries for whom that Declaration was most immediately relevant. Understanding the Nigerian patent system requires not only understanding what inventions can be patented, but understanding the structural weaknesses of the system that grants those patents and the international framework...

15 August

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Trademark Licensing and Assignment in Nigeria

Posted by Kolawole Adebowale

in Class Notes, Educational Articles, Exam Preparation, IP Law

Every time a Nigerian franchise partner opens a KFC or Shoprite outlet, they are operating under a trademark licence arrangement: they have been authorised by the overseas brand owner to use the registered mark in connection with their business in Nigeria, without ever owning the mark themselves. Every time a Nigerian manufacturer of branded goods is acquired by a competitor who continues to sell under the original brand name, a trademark assignment has occurred: ownership of the mark has been transferred from one legal entity to another. These are among the most commercially significant transactions in the Nigerian business landscape,...

09 July

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Trademark Infringement in Nigeria: How Courts Assess Confusion, Similarity and Counterfeiting

Posted by Kolawole Adebowale

in Class Notes, Educational Articles, IP Law

Walk into a roadside pharmacy in Oshodi and you might find a box labelled "Panadon" sitting next to genuine "Panadol" on the shelf. The packaging uses the same blue-and-white colour scheme. The font is nearly identical. A tired, unwell shopper grabbing medication quickly may not notice the difference. In a market where counterfeit pharmaceuticals have killed people, the question of whether these two marks are confusingly similar is not an abstract legal exercise. It is a public safety question that trademark law must answer. Understanding how Nigerian courts determine whether trademark infringement has occurred, how they assess whether one mark is...

09 July

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How to Register a Trademark in Nigeria: Parts A and B of the Register

Posted by Kolawole Adebowale

in Class Notes, Educational Articles, IP Law, Study Resources

Imagine you have spent three years building a small pepper sauce brand in Port Harcourt. Your distinctive label, your invented brand name, and the loyal customer base you have cultivated across the Niger Delta represent real commercial value. One morning you discover that a Lagos distributor has started selling a very similar product under a nearly identical name, and is already advertising it to retailers. You want to sue. Then your lawyer asks the single most important procedural question in Nigerian trademark law: is your mark registered? If the answer is no, section 3 of the Trade Marks Act immediately closes...

09 June

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Emotional Perception AI Ltd v Comptroller General of Patents [2026] UKSC 3: How the Supreme Court Rewrote the Rules on AI Patents

Posted by Kolawole Adebowale

in AI and Law, Case Analysis, Educational Articles, Landmark Judgments

For twenty years, a UK patent applicant whose invention ran on a computer faced a particular kind of frustration. It was not enough to show that the invention was new, clever, or commercially valuable. The applicant first had to survive a threshold test that had nothing to do with those qualities. Under the Aerotel framework, the courts asked a preliminary question that tripped up a significant number of genuinely novel software and artificial intelligence inventions before they could even be assessed on their merits. In February 2026, the UK Supreme Court looked at that framework, found it logically flawed, and...

01 May

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How to Acquire Membership of a Company in Nigeria and Who Qualifies

Posted by Kolawole Adebowale

in 300 Level, Class Notes, Company Law, Educational Articles, Exam Preparation, Study Resources

In Nigerian company law, being a shareholder and being a member of a company are not the same thing. A person may hold shares in a company without yet being its member. A member may cease to hold shares and yet remain on the register. The distinction, which Nigerian courts have consistently maintained, is not a technicality. It determines who may vote at general meetings, who may enforce the articles as a statutory contract, who bears liability in a winding up, and whose name appears on the document that constitutes the ultimate proof of membership: the register of members. This article...

01 May

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Keir v Leeman (1846) 9 QB 371: When an Agreement to Drop Charges Becomes Illegal

Posted by Kolawole Adebowale

in 200 Level, Case Analysis, Educational Articles, Landmark Judgments, Law of Contract

Suppose a creditor has secured a judgment against a debtor, and in the process of enforcing it, the debtor's associates commit riot and attack a police officer. The creditor lays criminal charges. A third party then offers to pay the outstanding debt if the creditor drops the prosecution. The creditor agrees, abandons the charges, and the third party refuses to pay. Can the creditor sue to recover? That is precisely the question resolved in Keir v Leeman (1846) 9 QB 371. The answer was no. The Keir v Leeman agreement to stifle prosecution was held void as contrary to public policy,...

26 April

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Corporate Personality in Nigerian Law: The Salomon Principle and the Veil of Incorporation

Posted by Kolawole Adebowale

in 300 Level, Class Notes, Company Law, Educational Articles

Every year in Nigeria, thousands of companies are incorporated through the Corporate Affairs Commission. The promoters sign the memorandum of association, pay the prescribed fees, and receive their certificate of incorporation. What many of them do not immediately grasp is that something remarkable has happened at the moment that certificate is issued: a new legal person has come into existence. Not a human person, but a person nonetheless, one capable of owning property, entering contracts, suing and being sued, and outliving every human being who created it. This is the doctrine of corporate personality, and it is the single most foundational...

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